12 Trivia Tidbits for Friday, April 26, 2024

As periodic cicadas start to emerge and annoy the absolutely shit out of North America, some locals are calling the cops to report mysterious sirens. The Newberry County Sheriff’s Office posted to Facebook to remind residents it’s just a whole bunch of bugs. Perhaps if we didn’t defund the police, they’d have enough ammunition to shoot every last cicada.

Archaeologists making renovations to Mount Vernon, George Washington’s home, found two old glass jars full of cherries hidden beneath the floorboards. Come to think of it, Zachary Taylor died from eating too many cherries... coincidence???

Coca-Cola claims it’s for environmental “sustainability,” as removing dye from recycled plastic is a barrier to reusing the substance. But a cynic might point out that the iconic green bottles are extremely recognizable when they roll down the street or wash up in the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, and they don’t want their product so obviously associated with trash as the planet burns and people come to realize that recycling is largely a lie.

A Belgian man was examined by three different doctors, who all confirmed he has auto-brewery syndrome, an incredibly rare disease wherein the body can produce alcohol in the intestines. He also happens to work at a brewery, which complicated his case, but charges were ultimately dropped.

The Department of Transportation just dropped some new rules requiring airlines to reimburse travelers for cancelled (or irritatingly delayed) flights, and for smaller nuisances like bad in-flight Wi-Fi.

The U.S. government handed $5 billion to Lockheed Martin to crank out a few choppers to be used as Marine One, the president’s helicopter transport. But the gas and wind expelled upon takeoff and landing keeps on decimating the White House lawn, and they can’t figure out how to stop it.

Tolls aside, this makes Venice the first major city to make people pay to get in, like it’s some kind of theme park.

A crazed fan sent Styles over 8,000 letters in the span of a month, and was sentenced to 14 weeks in prison, as well as a decade-long restraining order preventing her from seeing him perform. 

Bush was forced to give up his Heisman trophy after an investigation found that he’d accepted money from potential agents, back when it was illegal to be paid for putting your body on the line to make billionaires richer. Now that student athletes are allowed to accept gifts and sponsorships, high-profile athletes have been advocating for returning Bush’s trophy.

The Thermonator, a smartphone-controlled, four-legged android equipped with a gasoline or straight-up napalm flamethrower, is available for retail purchase for the Elon Musk-ass price of $9,420.

A woman who lost her hands in a car accident in 2016 got hand transplants from a male donor in 2017. She’s recently reported that they’ve become more feminine over time, and have even started to better match her skin tone.

Five military horses broke loose from a rehearsal of the stupidly named Trooping of the Colours parade, and stampeded around London, stomping cars and stuff. The stupidly named Commanding Officer of the Household Cavalry Mounted Regiment said, stupidly, “Thankfully, considering the frequency of exercise and numbers of horses involved, this type of incident is extremely rare.”